"Get your shoulder into it!"
"Fight for that last inch there!"
"Knock him off his feet!"
"Put your man out o' the play!"
"Break him up!"
No one paid any attention to the scrubs, fighting desperately with the same loyalty against the odds of weight and organization, without hope of distinction, giving every last ounce of their strength in futile, frantic effort, rejoicing when flung aside and crushed under the victorious rush of the varsity, who alone counted.
Against the scrubs Stover felt a sort of rage. Time after time he went crashing into the line, seeing the blurred faces of his own comrades with an instinctive hatred, striking them with his shoulder, hurling them from the path of attack with a wild, uncontrollable fury at their resistance, almost unable to keep his temper in leash. The first feeling of sympathy he had felt so acutely for those who bore all the brunt of the punishment, unrewarded, was gone. He no longer felt any pity, but a brutal joy at the incessant smarting, grinding shock of the attack of which he was part and the touch of prostrate bodies under his rushing feet.
Thursday and Friday the practise was lightened for all except for the backs. For an hour he was kept at his punting in the open and behind the lines, while the scrubs, reënforced by every available veteran, swarmed through the line, seeking to block his kicks.
To one side a little knot of coaches watched the result with critical anxiety, following the length of the punts in grim silence.
Tompkins, behind him, from time to time, spoke quietly, knowing that his was a nature to be restrained rather than goaded on.